


Let me wish you a Merry Christmas

by softlyspoken



Series: it’s the most wonderful time of the year [3]
Category: Emmerdale, robron
Genre: Christmas Fluff, M/M, Neighbours AU, Robert is the grinch?? Sort of, the tiniest angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-21
Updated: 2019-12-21
Packaged: 2021-02-26 02:47:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21886192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softlyspoken/pseuds/softlyspoken
Summary: Robert’s trying to battle through the Christmas season without enjoying it one bit but his sister and a surprising helper won’t let him
Relationships: Aaron Dingle/Robert Sugden
Series: it’s the most wonderful time of the year [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1574866
Comments: 8
Kudos: 63





	Let me wish you a Merry Christmas

**Author's Note:**

> I’m so glad that people are enjoying these festive fics. There’s more to come!

  
Robert doesn’t usually hate Christmas. It means gifts and extravagance and people jealous of who he is and what he gets to have.

This Christmas though, he’s staring at a brick wall that’s apparently a feature one and trying not to hate everything about his new place. The one he got after Chrissie chucked divorce papers at his feet and told him to get out of her life forever.

He’s done that, and now he’s alone in every way that matters to him. Vic makes out like it’s a good thing that Chrissie’s ended it, says that his heart wasn’t in it and he doesn’t want to understand her at all.

So he wallows, spends half his days working from home and hating himself and the other half thinking of who can help get his leg over because that’s got to make things better. Once, when it hasn’t worked and he’s sloping home, he’s met with the sound of music from opposite his. 

Christmas music. At half one in the music. It’s not blaring, it’s bearable maybe but Robert’s really trying to forget about Christmas altogether and this isn’t helping in any way at all.

He goes to pound the door down and then he remembers how he doesn’t really want to talk to anyone. So he bares it. He gets by and Vic rings him every single day and asks if he’s doing any better like he’s actually ill.

He’s not. He’s fine and her attempts at trying to make him get into the Christmas spirit are becoming ridiculous. 

It starts with a reef on his door, placed almost perfectly and matching the Christmas music by the idiot who lives opposite him. It’s green and bright and enough to make him hang his head and sort of hate his sister.

“You should stop you know.” Robert says, days later, because there’s now gingerbread men wrapped nearly in a Christmas bow by his door. 

“Stop what?” Vic says, acting innocent. He swipes the biscuits up, swings the door shut and eats one. “Good then.”

“This isn’t helpful.” Robert says, but they are good and for a second he’s not thinking about what an utter failure his life is.

“Whatever.” Vic laughs. “You love me.”

And he does. What he doesn’t love is the tinsel draped around his door when he gets home from work a few days later. It’s bright red and he shakes his head at it before trying to take it down.

The person opposite him opens their door and shuts it again before Robert takes a look at them and he’s back to thinking they’re weird when there’s a slow hum of Christmas music playing again.

He thinks it might be a single mum, putting her kid in the mood or something. He couldn’t care less by the time there’s tinsel by his ankles. 

—

A few days before Christmas is when Vic ups the ante. He’s coming in from a shitty date, alone, when he nearly breaks his ankle on the smallest Christmas tree he’s ever seen. It’s just sitting right outside his door, decorated and shining. 

“For fuck’s sake.” He kicks at it, watches it topple down the stairs and out of sight. It’s probably going to wake up half of the building but he doesn’t care.

What he does care about is Vic calming the fuck down. He rings her a couple of days later because there’s baubles in a crate outside his door and more tinsel everywhere.

He’s thumping up the stairs to his when she pretends like she’s oblivious.

“I told him to stop. I promise.”

And, “ _What_?” He actually stops, frowns down the line like he doesn’t know what else to do. His sister is mad, mental sometimes but this is _beyond_. “Who are you on ab—“

Robert gets to his door and stops dead. He sees some guy with tinsel around his neck and some lit up reindeer ears on his head and he’s bending down to place something at Robert’s door.

“Vic. I’ll call you back.” Robert hangs up and looks at the man until he actually stops moving around and realises that Robert is staring blankly at him. “Do you want to explain or?”

The guy looks like he’s just been caught flashing a pensioner or something. “I ...”

“You’ve been leaving all this shit here?”

“What?” The guy just shakes his head. “I was ...”

“You know my sister?”

The guy’s face is bright red and Robert can’t help but stare deep into his eyes. “Well I ... I’m her mate.”

“Never mentioned she had weird mates.”

“I’m Aaron.” Aaron yanks the antlers off and presses a button so they stop flashing and Robert has absolutely no idea what to say. “She uh ... she said you weren’t feeling in the festive mood so ...”

Robert breathes in deeply. “Pity party for one then? How much did she pay ya to be an idiot?”

Aaron’s eyes widen. “Woah. Hang on a minute. She said you’d been through a shit time so I was trying to be ...”

“What?”

“Neighbourly.” Aaron shouts, and Robert’s face falls as he realises he’s the weirdo he plays Christmas music all the time. “I was trying to be nice ‘cause Christmas can be shit when you’re alone.”

“I’m not.” He is, well he sort of wants to be and it makes him feel sad and lost but also like deep down he deserves to be. “I don’t need your pity.”

“It’s not pity.” Aaron frowns like he genuinely cares and then he sighs. “I was just —“ Robert properly looks at him. His heart thumps and he throws a look towards the ground instead of looking back at him. “Sorry I bothered.”

He’s sorry and Robert just lets him walk back through his door without saying anything because he’s an idiot. He’s an idiot who picks up the box of mince pies at his door and drinks his way into Christmas Day.

He wakes up alone, head thumping and this tightness in his chest when he thinks of Aaron. He feels bad and he doesn’t usually. It’s on his mind when he gets a text from Vic about getting round hers as soon as. He watches Aaron’s door, just sort of stares for a second before he bottles it and drives to hers instead.

“You made it.” Vic says, apron on and Santa hat silly on her head. “You can keep them company. _Apologise_.”

“What?”

And there’s a small detail he forget about. It’s Vic’s oath of a boyfriend and the fact that he said a mate was coming around too. The mate, of course, is Aaron. He’s sitting watching the highlights of a match and he’s got this Christmas jumper on that says ‘bite me’. Robert smiles at him without realising and then Aaron sees him and stands.

“I don’t want any ...”

“Can I have a word?” Robert says, there’s this sticky feeling of warmth running through him when they get outside against the cold. “How come’s your here?”

“Mum’s on holiday.” Aaron shrugs. “Just staying for a bit and then I’m going to my uncle’s with my sister.”

“Sister?” Robert slows down as he walks.

Aaron nods. “Yeah. All that Christmas music was for her benefit. She’s mad on it.”

“So are you.”

“Had a shit one last year.” Aaron stops walking, hands deep in his pockets. “Spent it alone ‘cause I thought it would help.” There’s something lost in his eyes, something Robert understands. “It didn’t.”

Robert nods slowly. “That why you carried on when she said to stop?”

Aaron blinks, reddens. “Suppose so yeah.” 

Robert’s eyes flicker. “I should say ... thanks.” 

Aaron frowns. “Don’t have to.”

“You were being … nice.” Robert shrugs and Aaron pulls a face. He thinks he’s probably a hard man around here or something. “So thank you.”

Aaron looks up at him, hugging himself against the cold as they get back to Vic’s. “Sorry about your ex.” Maybe Robert’s stupid but Aaron stares at his lips, then up into Robert’s eyes again. 

Robert smiles faintly, he hasn’t thought about her or the sorry mess all day. “You are?”

Aaron bites his lip. “Maybe not. That depends.”

“On what?”

Aaron leans forward and then clearly bottles it and Robert is left disappointed until he shrugs. “You know, didn’t realise you were fit when Vic told me to start trying to get you in the festive mood.”

Robert smiles when Aaron turns bright red and pulls away slowly like he’s not used to being so upfront. “Yeah?” Aaron nods. “You’re not too bad yourself.” Aaron looks surprised like it’s a mad thing to say. It isn’t. He’s pretty nice to look at, really nice. 

“Think Vic’s put that there on purpose?” Aaron tilts his head, Robert looks up and sees mistletoe on the top of the door, tries not to think about his sister wanting to snog her mate. 

“Maybe.” Robert says, because Aaron’s clearly kind, he’s clearly fit, he clearly makes his heart thud and he stays stuck on his mind. So he leans down, kisses him and it feels like a lot of something suddenly.

Adam’s tapping on the window a few seconds later. He’s laughing, whooping and saying something about Aaron finally getting some.

“He’s a dick.” Aaron’s bright red. 

“Carry on kissing me then.” Robert says before leaning in and smiling.

“You in the Christmas mood yet?” Aaron whispers against Robert’s mouth before Robert nods and he kissing him again.

It’s not going to be such a shitty Christmas after all then.


End file.
